In this respect, _The Saint_, like _Uncle Tom's Cabin_
and similar books which crystallise an entire series of ideals or sum
up a crisis, leaped immediately into importance, and seems certain to
enjoy, for a long time to come, the prestige that crowns such works.
Putting it on the _Index_ can only add to its power.
VI
But readers who imagine that this aspect measures the significance of
_The Saint_ have read the surface only. The probability of restoring
friendly relations between Church and State is a matter of concern to
everybody in Italy; but of even greater concern are the implications
which issue from Signor Fogazzaro's thought. He is an evolutionist; he
respects the higher criticism; he knows that religions, like states and
secular institutions, have their birth and growth and inevitable decay.
So Catholicism must take its course in the human circuit, and expect
sooner or later to pass away. This would be the natural deduction to
draw from the premise of evolution. Signor Fogazzaro, however, does not
draw it. He conceives that Catholicism contains a final deposit of truth
which can neither be superseded, wasted, nor destroyed.
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